Sugars are usually known as energy storage units in plants and the insects that feed on them. But, sugars may also be part of a deadly game of tag between plant and insect according to scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology. Grasses and crops such as maize attach sugars to chemical defences called benzoxazinoids to protect themselves …
The exchange of chemical signals between organisms is considered the oldest form of communication. Acting as messenger molecules, pheromones regulate social interactions between conspecifics, for example, the sexual attraction between males and females. Fish rely on pheromones to trigger social responses and to coordinate reproductive behavior in males and females. Scientists at the Marine Science Center at the University of …
Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease type 1A is the most common inherited disease affecting the peripheral nervous system. Researchers from the Department of Neurogenetics at the Max Planck Institute of Experimental Medicine and University Medical Centre Göttingen have discovered that the maturity of Schwann cells is impaired in rats with the disease. These cells enwrap the nerve fibres with an insulating layer known …
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics (MPI-IE) in Freiburg re-activated expression of an ancient gene, which is not normally expressed in the mammalian immune system, and found that the animals developed a fish-like thymus. To the researchers surprise, while the mammalian thymus is utilized exclusively for T cell maturation, the reset thymus produced not only T …
Max Planck researchers have discovered a completely new way in which the immune system recognizes pathogens. The aryl hydrocarbon receptor has long been a focus of research for pharma-cologists and toxicologists, as it recognizes environmental toxins. However, it also plays an important role in the immune system. A team of scientists headed by Stefan H. E. Kaufmann at the Max …
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing in Cologne and University College London have now unearthed the way in which a specific genetic mutation leads to neuronal damage in two serious afflictions. In rare cases, patients may even suffer from these two diseases, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia, at the same time. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is …
Parkinson’s disease affects neurons in the Substantia nigra brain region – their mitochondrial activity ceases and the cells die. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics show that supplying D-lactate or glycolate, two products of the gene DJ-1, can stop and even counteract this process: Adding the substances to cultured HeLa cells and to cells …
Animals can use varying sensory modalities for orientation, some of which might be very different from ours. Some bird species for example take the polarization pattern produced by sunlight in the atmosphere to calibrate their orientation systems. Now researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Seewiesen, Germany, and Queen’s University Belfast have discovered with colleagues from Israel that …
Solanum pennellii, a wild tomato species endemic to the Andean region in South America, is characterised by its ability to tolerate extreme stress, such as drought. Solanum pennellii has frequently been crossed to harness this characteristic for cultivated tomatoes. Up until now, scientists did not know which genes were responsible for the stress tolerance. An international team of scientists, headed …